


Ghostly Adoption

by May1974



Category: Danny Phantom
Genre: ??? - Freeform, Adoption, Family, Feels, Fluff, Ghost Zone, Ghosts, Halfa, Not Beta Read, One Shot, Sibling bond, danny grew up in the ghost zone, danny phantom - Freeform, fenton family - Freeform, grew up in the ghost zone, learning acceptance, why is that not a tag
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-15
Updated: 2020-07-15
Packaged: 2021-03-05 04:01:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,077
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25278142
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/May1974/pseuds/May1974
Summary: Maddie Fenton had never felt so lost before. Her entire life’s work – everything she had devoted her time to, spent years obsessing over and studying, everything she ever hated – was sitting right across from her on her couch. In her living room. There was a ghost on her fucking couch. What the fuck. Said ghost was looking around in interest. His hair was a blinding white, his eyes a burning acidic green, and he casually sat there as if the woman across from him wasn’t holding a massive ectoplasmic gun that could kill him. Probably. It could probably kill him. Technically, he was already dead.
Relationships: Danny Fenton & Jack Fenton, Danny Fenton & Jazz Fenton, Danny Fenton & Maddie Fenton
Comments: 17
Kudos: 388





	Ghostly Adoption

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Sir_PitchPearl](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sir_PitchPearl/gifts).



> I don't know what the fuck this is. It started out as an idea that I had, and I could only write little drabbles. Eventually, it turned into this. Obviously, it's an AU, and there's a lot of personal headcanons going on. Feel free to comment what you think, if you have continuation ideas, or your own headcanons about this type of situation. 
> 
> A lot of stuff was implied but not directly stated, so I'm sorry if this one-shot is confusing.

■●■●■●■

**Ghostly Adoption**

Maddie Fenton had never felt so lost before. Her entire life’s work – everything she had devoted her time to, spent years obsessing over and studying, everything she ever hated – was sitting right across from her on her couch. In her living room. There was a ghost on her fucking couch. What the fuck. Said ghost was looking around in interest. His hair was a blinding white, his eyes a burning acidic green, and he casually sat there as if the woman across from him wasn’t holding a massive ectoplasmic gun that could kill him. Probably. It could probably kill him. Technically, he was already dead.

“A nice nest you have here,” he commented.

Maddie looked at him with narrowed eyes. “Nest?” She said. “What do you mean?”

A small frown formed, and he shrugged. “Nest as in, like – home. That’s it, I think. Right? A home? Sorry, there’s so many names for it where I come from. It gets lost in translation.”

“And do you mind telling me where you’re from?”

His frown melted into a smirk. A shit-eating smirk that annoyed Maddie to no end. “Wouldn’t you like to know,” he quipped.

She raised her gun in a threatening manner. “Don’t forget that right now you’re chained with ghost-proof handcuffs, and I can return you should I decide you’re a lost cause,” she warned. He may have appeared as a young boy – no older than fourteen – but ghosts were deceptive. They didn’t always look their age. “I will not let my kindness be taken for granted – especially by the likes of _you_. Now, explain. Tell me everything – and exactly what you meant by ‘ _I’m technically not a ghost_ ’ back there.”

“Full ghost,” he said. “I’m technically not a full ghost.”

He leaned back in the couch and looked up at the ceiling. He eyes traced things she couldn’t see, and then he whistled. “Wow, this place is bigger on the inside, isn’t it?”

She had so many questions.

He saw her expression and shrugged. “Ghosts don’t need eyes.”

He didn’t explain.

She stood and jabbed the gun at him again. “Look, Phantom, I’m not going to entertain you. I want you to tell me everything, or so help me, I will just return you right back to the Guys in White –”

The ghost moved, and Maddie startled when the room dropped dangerously in temperature. The handcuffs he wore, which were ghost-proof – they were supposed to be ghost-proof – were enveloped in sparkling ice and were promptly snapped off his wrists. He shook himself as if getting rid of kinks in his muscles and rubbed his gloved wrist. A light enveloped the room. He looked up at Maddie with green eyes one moment, and she blinked and was suddenly staring at blue. Bright blue.

Blue so blue that she was shocked cold. She shivered harshly. Her breath caught.

“Phantom is my ghostly name, but I prefer Danny,” he said. And then he smiled.

And god help Maddie – he looked so human.

■●■●■●■

After Maddie got over the whole transformation and finally realized that it wasn’t just Phantom, or Danny – hell, she didn’t even know anymore – disguising himself as human, she lost her shit. All the pieces started to fall into place. No fucking wonder all the other ghosts referred to him as ‘ghost child’ or ‘halfa.’ It’s because that’s what he was – a halfa. Half ghost, half human.

She didn’t know how. She didn’t even know it was possible. But there he sat in all his impossible glory, chowing down on the ecto-contaminated pasta that she had previously been about to throw out.

“You should be dead,” she said.

He paused long enough to grin at her. “Kind of late for that.”

She didn’t think she would ever get used to his death jokes.

Maddie didn’t know how to respond. “But even as a half-ghost, in your human state, you shouldn’t be able to process ectoplasm safely. Some ectoplasm won’t be fatal; ecto-contamination is common in Amity. But with the ratio you’re consuming – it should be eating you from the inside out. It should be poisoning you.”

He shrugged. “Eh, I just choose not to think about it. Like, both sides of me need to be fed, so I’m not going to look a gift horse in the mouth.” He stuffed his mouth, then swallowed and looked awkward when Maddie continued to stare. “That’s the expression, right?”

And he kept doing that.

He kept messing up expressions or using strange words in the wrong context.

“What era are you from?” She said. Because he was a mystery. He knew how to work high-tech and knew his way around towns and modern cities. He seemed pretty acquainted with Amity Park. But then he would make out-dated references and mess up with language.

The ghost boy – Danny, she had to remind herself – stilled. “It’s … best not to think about that, either.”

“Oh, no, if I’m going to be accommodating you, you’re going to answer all my questions,” she said. She placed both hands down on the table, looking down on him. “Or you go back to the GIW.”

He scowled at her. “Yeah, I’m absolutely loving the threats. Keep that up. I’m not even restricted anymore; I can leave at any time I want.” He stabbed at the pasta with his fork. Maddie didn’t know why, but she found it fascinating that he knew how to use it. She found it fascinating how he still had the physical need to eat. She was entranced by this enigma – but at the same time she hated everything he was and represented. After a short moment, his scowl dropped, and he sighed. He stopped aggressively assaulting his pasta. “I’ve been through all the eras, to be honest. Probably. Except for the future – man, the future sucks. At least, in my dimension. Oh, yeah, I’m not from this dimension.”

She blinked once. Twice. “Dimension? You’re from a different dimension?”

He looked up at her with surprise, for once looking his age. He looked young, and she saw an eagerness in his eyes that hadn’t been there before. “You believe me?”

“Well, the concept of other dimensions has been around for a while,” she said flippantly. She didn’t want this ghost to think that she trusted him. “If the Ghost Zone can exist on another plane of reality, parallel to our own, then believing in other dimensions isn’t too far of a stretch.”

The ghost looked excited. His eyes lit up. “Finally, someone gets it!”

She quirked a brow. “You’re not out of the bushes.”

He smiled. “Yeah, I know, but that’s enough for me. You have no idea how long I’ve been trying to convince people that I’m not from here – like, gods, if it wasn’t obvious enough –”

The ghost child went off on a long tangent, and Maddie was startled by how open he had suddenly become. He spoke and acted like a teenager, a regular human teen going through puberty. He was so overwhelmingly human that for a moment, she couldn’t see the ghost in him at all. But then he started talking about space and stars, and she saw his eyes flash a neon green in excitement. Being in a human form didn’t seem to restrict him from using his ghostly abilities. He was floating out of his seat, but he didn’t seem to notice.

Throwing his hands around, gesturing to things she couldn’t see, he began to recount how he went to the moon and got to see constellations from all over the world. Maddie had half a mind to think it was all fabricated, but his details were so specific, and he was so eager, she could do nothing but believe.

She reached out and yanked him down from the air, grip tight on his wrist.

Suddenly, she felt a cold shock go through her, and the ghost boy floated lower in a defensive stance. He looked startled, eyes wide and scared. Like somehow Maddie was the monster.

She swallowed. “If you’re going to stay in this house, you have to act human.”

The ghost child was silent.

“On your feet,” she said. “No floating. I’m not housing a ghostly teen. To everyone else, you’re human. Humans don’t float and glow green.”

“I’m … staying?” He said. “You’ll let me stay?”

He looked close to crying.

He completely dismissed the anti-ghost talk.

Maddie felt her maternal instincts pull to him. She gritted her teeth and looked away from his too-big blue eyes. His impossibly human eyes. She couldn’t let him trick her. Ghosts were mischievous creatures; they preyed on the emotions and gullibility of others. “Of course, I’m not a monster. But only for study. One wrong move and I’ll –”

She was interrupted by a sudden figure barrelling into her. She stumbled and looked down at the boy hugging her tightly. His mop of black hair was impossibly soft. He choked back a sob. “I haven’t had a home in so long.” Maddie was not crying. She was not. “Thank you so much.”

■●■●■●■

It took time to adjust to life with a ghost boy.

Jack was not on-board at all. He would constantly yell ‘GHOST’ and become trigger-happy regarding any sudden movements that Phantom – or Danny, as he asked to be called – made. He always had his ecto-gun on his hip and went to extreme measures to try and get the halfa to confess to manipulating them and trying to take over the world.

Surprisingly, Jazz bonded with the boy easily. She prepared food for him, took care of his laundry, and showed him how to do the common household chores – at least, what was considered common in the Fenton house. In fact, she cared so much for the boy that she refused to speak to Maddie after she found out what her mother was doing with the boy – “And how dare you psychologically abuse and take advantage of such a young and impressionable boy, ghost or not.”

The Fenton household was in chaos the first week.

Danny – who seemingly changed moods at the drop of a dime, now happy and bubbly and eager – often floated around the house and explored.

Several times he was chased out of the lab by Jack.

He also accidentally spooked the Fentons in the middle of the night. Maddie didn’t think she would ever get used to waking up at three in the morning to a ghost child chugging pure ectoplasm straight from her Mother’s Day mug in the lab, where he shouldn’t have been because it was ghost proofed.

The boy was impossible. He was a paradox. He was Schrödinger’s boy.

Science, which Maddie had come to trust and find comfort in, could seemingly not explain Danny Phantom. He was dead. He was very dead. But he was also very much alive.

And Maddie felt uneasy at how human he appeared.

■●■●■●■

Progress was slow. Maddie took blood samples from the boy, but the moment she put them in Petri dishes, they would spoil. The ectoplasm would eat away at the blood and then die off without an energy source – a ghost’s core. Left in tubes, the samples would slowly corrode. When taken from his human form, it was blood was mixed with ectoplasm. When taken from his ghostly form, it was ectoplasm mixed with blood.

She was ready to tear out her hair. She was getting nowhere.

Maddie had half a mind to give the boy back to the GIW. He wasn’t any use. She wasn’t making any advancements with him, and he was only taking up resources and was a pain in the ass.

But for some reason, she felt it was wrong to leave him in the hands of the GIW.

She had seen their plans for him, and it was wrong on so many levels.

It was unethical.

Of course, one could argue that it didn’t matter because Danny was a ghost, and ghosts couldn’t feel pain or emotions. Ghosts weren’t capable of compassion or sympathy like humans. They were a shell of humans, only driven by their obsessions and cores.

But every time she reached for the phone, or thought about it, or looked over at the business card they left her with, something in her went cold. She wasn’t sure if it was Danny’s unnatural coldness getting to her, if he was somehow influencing or overshadowing her, or if she had just gone soft. She refused to accept what it meant if the latter were true. Ghosts naturally preyed on a human’s gullibility. They were manipulative and masters of deception. They were scarily good at mimicking human expressions. She couldn’t care for a ghost because a ghost couldn’t care for her.

She didn’t want to believe she was falling prey to the ghost that seemed the most human.

■●■●■●■

Maddie was proven wrong one day. The realization was so sudden and forceful that her breath caught, and she faltered – and her mistake almost cost her life.

She was ghost-hunting.

After finding out that Danny had what he called a ‘ghost sense,’ the Fentons had grudgingly taken him on hunts. His ghost sense was more reliable and sensitive then any of their gadgets, and he could even zero-in on ectosignatures and recognize the different energy charges. He could tell how powerful a ghost was, if its intent was malevolent, and he could track it down with scary precision.

Maddie was almost shocked when he willingly went with them to hunt ghosts. She was tempted to put ghost-proof handcuffs on him, to stop him from trying to stop them from hurting any ghosts, but she knew it would be useless. He was able to get past all their ghost-proof devices.

Somehow.

She didn’t know how.

He wouldn’t explain it to her.

And they had charged down the main street in the Fenton Ghost Assault Vehicle – the GAV – and had pulled over to park and track on foot. Maddie had strictly told Danny to remain in the GAV, because he was no longer needed, and he hadn’t been allowed out in public ever since the Fentons took him in. Letting a ghost loose in the public would be wrong, after all – even if it was only half ghost.

But it turns out the ghost was a bit more than they could handle, and they had bitten off more than they could chew. Maddie’s ectogun was losing its charge, and Jack was wasting all his shots.

They were cornered and Maddie really wished Jack’s Fenton Thermos worked.

And then the ghost was being blasted into a wall, tackled by a glowing figure in black and white, and the alley fell silent. She quickly stepped over the rubble to follow the fight – because that had definitely been a second ghost, and two ghosts was worse than one – and she was shocked dumb at what she saw. For the first time, she understood the difference between Phantom and Danny. Because there she saw Phantom. It wasn’t Danny – it wasn’t the human boy she had gotten to know over the past few weeks, it wasn’t the boy with bright blue eyes who laughed and was interested in everything and was clumsy and shy. It was Phantom – the dangerous ghost wanted by the GIW, the ghost with blazing acidic green eyes that was powerful and scary and arrogantly confident.

The difference was astounding. Everything became so clear, like a camera coming into focus.

“ _Mine_ ,” he said. “Don’t you dare touch mine.”

Danny hadn’t transformed into a ghost outside of the Fentons doing experiments, and Maddie had forgotten how strong his presence was. The temperature dropped several degrees. Frost formed on the broken glass, and the ground became icy. Phantom’s anger was tangible.

He fought the ghost, beat him blue even though he clearly had the upper hand and didn’t need to continue throwing punches. He grabbed the ghost by the collar of its shirt.

And then Phantom’s hand was blazing green and sparking like she had never seen it before.

He reached out into the air and pulled, and then there was a tear forming – and the air buzzed and crackled with uneasy electricity, the fabric of space and time ripping.

Then he fucking punted the ghost into the tear.

It promptly closed.

And then he turned around as if nothing had even happened, and he was floating over to Maddie and Jack, green eyes wide and no longer acid, but instead innocent and worried. And he flitted about the two Fentons, asking about injuries or wounds. It was almost impossible to convince the halfa that they could walk back to the GAV on their own, and that he didn’t need to fly them back.

It was only later that Maddie thought to ask Danny – when he was back in human form, and they were in the lab – what he meant by ‘mine.’

And he turned to them and blinked like they were stupid.

“They shouldn’t have touched my humans,” he said. “I won’t let them harm what’s mine.”

Maddie wasn’t sure whether that was a good thing.

■●■●■●■

Once they began to warm up to Danny, and they had yet to progress in the science of the ghost field, Jack and Maddie decided to delve into ghost culture. One of the first things Maddie asked was what Phantom’s obsession was, or if he even had one, considering Danny was only half ghost. She had gotten a rude shock when the entire room became coated in ice and Danny disappeared, quite literally, and didn’t talk to her for hours after. Apparently, there were certain topics that were considered sensitive and private for a ghost.

But it didn’t take long for her to realize what his obsession was, or what it was based on.

Despite his restriction to the Fenton house, he often snuck out at night and fought against the ghosts that plagued Amity Park. He was on the news a lot. He was labeled a hero by many. There were shaky videos of him saving countless people from malevolent ghosts.

Maddie never brought this up with Danny. She knew he didn’t think he was getting away with it, but anytime they got close to the subject, he would get antsy.

And Maddie knew with complete certainty that she couldn’t stop him if she tried.

It was his obsession.

Protection – specifically of his home.

And he considered Amity Park his home now.

For some reason, he was obsessed with protecting Amity Park, despite the numerous people who called him a menace and monster. He ignored the hate and protests and continued to fight.

Even within the Fenton household, he was fiercely protective of them. Maddie noticed the shift in behaviour. She didn’t know if he was conscious of it, could control it, or if he could stop it – or if he even wanted to stop it. He began trying to help all the time. He wanted to go everywhere with Jazz. He insisted on going on ghost hunts with the Fentons, and though he didn’t say it, Maddie knew it was because he wanted to protect them. He wanted to protect two people who constantly threatened him and used him as a lab experiment.

Maddie was unsure if this was just his ghost core and obsession overwhelming his common sense, or if he actually had enough human in him to be fond for their human family.

■●■●■●■

Turns out, ghosts celebrate both their birthday and death day. The only reason Maddie knows this is because Jazz corners her in the house and demands that they celebrate Danny’s upcoming birthday, and she threatens Maddie. Jazz Fenton threatens her mother, who carries a gun on her at all times, and it’s quite a shock to her system. It’s also a wake-up call.

She and Jack spend countless hours trying to come up with something to get him.

They could bake him a cake the way they usually bake, without any precautions, and it would be contaminated with enough ectoplasm for him to thoroughly enjoy it.

But they didn’t know what gift to get him.

They confide in Jazz, who has practically become his older sister.

She tells them that she’s looking into enrolling him in school – a human school – and that she’s teaching him about humans and their community so that he can make more friends. He really wants to integrate into Amity Park. He really considers it his home. And she fights her parents on this and hides the backpack and school supplies she bought him so that they can’t destroy them or throw them out.

But it’s this that get’s them thinking.

Danny just wants to have a home in Amity Park. He wants to be accepted.

Jack, who is still wary about Danny, becomes very eager when he realizes that Danny is interested in anything human. He sets off to make his special fudge for his birthday.

Maddie is left sitting at the table, thinking.

And the thought that pops into her head is horrible.

But her lips pull into a thin line; she supposes it’s only right.

■●■●■●■

Danny is very happy with the gifts. He’s so happy that he’s practically – and literally – glowing in his human form. There is a green light emanating from his complexion, and his freckles glow, too. His blue eyes look bright green now. His hair stands on end with electricity, floating almost. He’s more ghost than human, but he’s more than proved that he has the emotional capability of a human.

A strange, high-pitched noise – perhaps a smaller version of his ghostly wail – escapes him when Jazz tells him about having a chance to go to human school. He’s grinning, his canines sharp. There’s a weird sound – a purring and vibration – that Maddie is shocked to find is coming from Danny’s chest. Jazz had told her that Danny confided in her about his core, about how it had felt different recently. His core was him. He was his core. A ghost couldn’t live without its core. And apparently, a ghost’s core was sentient, separate to the ghost itself. And a ghost’s core could purr like a cat.

He devours the fudge that Jack gets him, and eagerly sweeps the big man up in a hug when Jack finally consents to it, somehow knocking the big man off his feet.

Ghost strength, Maddie supposed.

And then it’s time for Maddie’s gift, and she hopes she got it right.

She pulls out the papers and holds them out for Danny to read. His eyes begin to water, blue seeping back in, making him look young and human again. Maddie’s not sure if that’s a good reaction.

“You’re free to go if you want,” she says. “I … I’ve realized that you’re a person. You’re more than just a ghost. You’re more than just a human. And you’ve opened my eyes to a lot about ghosts. If you want, you can leave whenever you want.” Then she hesitates, choking on her words. She had never planned on becoming so attached to the halfa. “But I want the chance to adopt you. You’re welcome into our family, as a Fenton. Danny Fenton.”

Danny is crying suddenly, and he falls into Maddie’s arms, impossibly cold. But Maddie finds that she no longer minds it. Somehow, from the moment she took him in, she knew this was going to happen. From the moment she saw those green eyes flash blue behind the glass, she knew the he was different.

And he’s thanking her, mumbling, holding onto her like she might disappear.

Later, when the celebration ends, and Danny passes out in his bedroom, Jazz stops Maddie to talk with her. “That … I didn’t expect that from you,” she said. “You know, that was his biggest fear – being rejected. Because from the moment you welcomed him in this house, he was attached. He wanted to protect us. Said he couldn’t help it. But he was terrified that it was never going to be reciprocated. And I … I loved him. He was like the little brother I never had. I thought you would never …”

Jazz suddenly embraces her mother, something she hasn’t done for years. The two had never been able to connect. That changed when Danny came into their lives. He was like the missing link in their family. Maddie feels her own tears form.

“Thank you for accepting him.”

Maddie shakes her head. “I’m grateful he chose us.”

■●■●■●■

**Author's Note:**

> Happy (belated) birthday Sir_PitchPearl!


End file.
